Some aldermen challenge Emanuel's police, TIF spending priorities

But they face uphill battle in changing budget

Ald. Patrick O'Connor, 40th, chides the council for not getting along during discussion on discharging the TIF fund. (Nancy Stone, Chicago Tribune)

Self-styled independent aldermen challenged key portions of Mayor Rahm Emanuel's 2014 spending plan Wednesday, but if the pushback to their ideas is any indication, they may have a hard time gaining traction.

Southwest Side Ald. Ricardo Munoz unveiled a proposal to use $25 million to hire an additional 500 police officers. The 22nd Ward alderman said that makes more sense than the mayor's plan to hold police manpower steady next year and instead set aside $71 million to pay those officers overtime to bolster the number of cops on the street as the city tries to clamp down on gun violence.

The City Council's progressive caucus previously had floated the possibility of hiring an additional 1,000 officers next year, but Munoz said aldermen weren't able to identify enough money to get that far. "It's what we could find," he said. "It's unrealistic to say 1,000 (new officers) when you can only find $25 million."

City budget officials have taken the position that it's less expensive to increase police overtime than to add to the ranks, saying it costs $63 an hour to put a cop on overtime on the street but $89 an hour to put a full-time officer to work once benefits are taken into account.

In past years, the mayor has shown willingness to compromise at the margins on his budgets, but Emanuel budget spokeswoman Kelley Quinn on Wednesday reiterated the administration's reasons for relying on overtime.

"We will continue to meet with aldermen to discuss their ideas on public safety and explain the strategies being deployed by the police department to reduce crime across the city," Quinn said in an email in response to Munoz's proposal. "The strategic use of overtime allows us to maximize every dollar available toward that effort."

Munoz announced his idea the same day progressive caucus aldermen unsuccessfully tried to get a hearing on a plan to move about $200 million in unencumbered special property tax money out of geographically organized development funds and put it back in the general budgets of Chicago Public Schools, City Hall and other governments.

Ald. John Arena, 45th, argued that money currently locked up in so-called tax increment financing districts would more equitably serve all Chicagoans if it could be used to balance the school budget and build big-ticket projects where they were most needed rather than only in the areas where the money is raised.

"The problem is, at the end of the year, if there's money sitting in the TIF, it is not helping anybody," Arena said.

During a protracted debate, several aldermen said the money in special tax districts is one of the few ways they can pay for projects in their neighborhoods. "These things don't run on hopes and prayers. We need cash," said Ald. Jason Ervin, 28th.

Emanuel's council floor leader, Ald. Patrick O'Connor, invoked the infamous 1980s Council Wars era while warning opposition aldermen not to push issues like the tax district plan simply to score political points.

"We were castigated as being people who were not interested in progress but interested in fighting for the sake of fighting. It was the rawest of political power times," O'Connor, 40th, said of the years when Harold Washington was mayor and the alderman was part of a council bloc who challenged him.

Emanuel proposes tapping surplus TIF district money to add about $8.7 million to city coffers and about $24 million to the school district's bottom line in 2014, an amount critics contend is inadequate. The opposition attempt to get a hearing on the broader TIF proposal was defeated 36-11.

The mayor's allies also blocked a vote on Arena's measure calling for a citywide referendum on switching to an elected school board.

Also on Wednesday:

•Emanuel introduced a plan to increase license fees for the owners of the horse-drawn carriages common in tourist areas downtown. The mayor's ordinance also would switch the location where the temperature is taken to see if it is too cold or too hot for the horses to walk the streets, from O'Hare International Airport to Northerly Island, where it tends to be cooler.

•Ald. James Balcer, 11th, introduced a plan to rename the Chicago Cultural Center to honor Eleanor "Sis" Daley, wife of Mayor Richard J. Daley and mother of Mayor Richard M. Daley. Sis Daley was credited with helping save the Michigan Avenue building, which at the time was Chicago Public Library's central building.